Genso Suikoden- McDohls Madness
by Raven Chaos
Summary: How far can one be driven by their burden? By all means, R


Genso Suikoden-McDohls Madness  
  
  
By Raven Chaos  
ravenkoruki@aol.com  
  
Disclaimer: All hail Konami, king of Games!  
(except for Sqauresoft, whom are the Golden Emperors of Games)  
  
Authors note: McDohl carries with him a great burden. with but a flick of his hand, he can take  
life away. Such burdens can weigh heavy on one so young, yet so war torn. He has the power  
to end wars in seconds. But, if given the choice to use the Rune freely, could he do so?  
  
  
  
After the battle of Scarletia, before confronting General Millich, Suikoden 1...  
  
  
Young Tir McDohl stood amongst the fields of battle. The once calm spring day was   
shatteredby the crash of bone and sinew. He glanced around...where once stood many soldiers   
of the empire, nowstood his own men, standing amongst the dead.  
Even at his feet, a soldier lay dying. McDohl felt sick...his stomach churning with nausea as a   
quick wiff of the smell of stiffening joints and blood in the grass passed his nose.  
So distracted was he, that he took no notice to the approaching clang of footsteps.  
  
Though injured severely, one Imperial Officer would not die without at least taking one of these  
back-stabbing cowards with him. This was but a boy before him. An easy target. He raised his spear to   
strike...  
  
  
"Tir! Look out!" a soldier cried.  
  
  
McDohl's eyes sprung open, as if coming to from a dream, a terrible nightmare. On instinct, he  
swerved around, staff in hand intended to send some foe sprawling back. But his staff was not in his hand   
that he shot forth. Rather, it was his right hand. The hand that beared the Rune.  
Immediately, the Imperial's spear stopped in mid-thrust. His eyes lit up in terrible pain. The spear  
fell to the ground, and he fell to his knee's.  
McDohl stood over this fell man, his right hand still outstretched palm-outwards. All around him,  
the battlefield seemed to distort, leaving just him and this man on a small patch of bloodied earth.   
A red glow came to McDohls eyes as he stood there. Slowely, yet fluently, he turned his out-stretched  
hand around, so that his palm was staring him in the face and the rune cast it's scarlet glow on the soldier.  
He clenched the hand into a fist. The soldier let out a cry of angish and clutched his heart.  
Blood seeped from the soldiers half opened mouth as he knelt there, frozen, clutching his iron-mail  
shrouded chest, as if the mother of all seizures had befell him. Finally, the soldiers eyes rolled back into his head  
and his body fell forward, and did not move again.  
  
The battlefield reappeared around McDohl as he once again seemed to have awaken from some  
dream. Before him, the soldier lay, a pool of blood surrounding his head.  
McDohl felt the nausea return as he passed out among the dead.  
  
  
  
one year after Suikoden 1...  
  
  
His hand tingled.  
  
McDohl looked up from the proposal he had been reading as instinctively gave the glove-covered  
a good scratching.   
"There's no more war...leave me be..." he said almost silently, turning back to the papers.  
The Rune started to itch again, more fiercely than it had only a second before. McDohl tried  
to ignore it and focus on his work. After a moment, he gave in and whipped off the glove, staring the Rune  
down with a look of anger and annoyance.  
The Rune simply stared back, as if daring McDohl to do something about it.  
  
For what seemed like years now, the Rune had been causing McDohl problems. At night he  
hardly could close his eyes without the visions of past deaths creeping into his dreams.  
McDohl closed his eyes and sighed, and was immediately assaulted once again by a vision.  
  
He saw a soldiers face, lying on a battlefield. Eyes open, but hollow and empty, filled with agony  
and pain. From his mouth, red blood ozzed out, creating a mecabre pillow of scarlet.  
The eyes...To whom would they never see again? They looked so sad...like those of a doll.  
McDohl had seen such eyes before. In his dreams he had seen them...Soldiers and common  
folk alike. Finally, he forced his eyes open. His breath was coming out ragged.  
He held his head in his left hand and wept.  
  
  
The first vision he had seen was Odessa. Whenever he had it, it was always the same. Cleo and   
Gremio laying the fallen Odessa Silverburg in the sewer ditch, which then swept her away to some wasteland  
unknown...  
  
He wept for what could have been hours, openly cursing his burden to bear. With tear-stained eyes,   
he glanced about his office. Looking for something. Anything. Finally, his eyes fell upon a sword held by an  
empty suit of armor used for decoration.  
Grasping the blade firmly in his left hand, McDohl layed his right hand down.   
"How should I do it?!" He growled. "Right in your face or cut the whole bloody thing off?!"  
He gritted his teeth. His eyes flared in anger. His left hand, shaking, raised to deliver a stroke to the  
accursed Rune of Life and Death.  
"...Thinky ou can taunt me, eh? Think you can turn Tir McDohl into your puppet?!"  
  
Suddenly, the left arm dropped to his side, but the anger never left McDohls eyes.  
"Oh ho..." he chuckled, shakign his head. "That's what you wanted me to do, isn't it?   
Yes, cut my hand off and you wouldn't have a master to hold you back! If so, you'd be free of me and able to  
kill who you want! Well, it won't work, you scythe-wielding shaft sucker! Not by a long shot!"  
His breath seethed through his clenched teeth as he thrusted his right hand into it's glove.  
He then turned and saw himself in a mirror across the room.  
The face reflected was twisted and evil. The eyes glowed bright red, and the lips were  
turned into a wicked grin.  
McDohl shook his head and pointed at the mirror. He spoke with an eery calmness.  
"You...you...You're creating these nightmares, aren't you?" He step toward the mirror.  
"Yes...yes...I see now...I see perfectly...You want me to lust for blood...You want me   
to kill to fill your dinner plate..."  
The face in the mirror seemed to chuckle.  
The reaction made McDohls blood boil.  
"How dare you! I command you, not the other way around!! I will not succumb to madness  
for your pleasure, heathen scar!"  
The reflections expression changed to that of confusion.  
"That's right...your magic won't work on me! You may have been able to pull  
Teds strings, but I won't have any of it!! I am he who governs life and death alone!!!"  
McDohl raised the sword. "You seem worried, Soul Eater...yes...you're afraid...  
Your puppet has turned against you...yes yes...Tremble, you worm!"  
McDohl advanced on the relfection.  
In his anger, McDohl smashed the sword into the mirror, and the flash exploded  
into pieces. McDohl stood trembling with anger. He looked about, an insane gleam in  
his eyes as he saw his foe now had vanished.  
"Where are you, heathen!?" He spat, swinging the sword around. "Show yourself  
to me, devil!"  
It seemed as if Soul Eater was all around, in one form or another. Even his   
desk bore it's evil.  
"Surround me, huh?! I'll cut you all down!"  
  
McDohl had laid waste to all of his office, "chasing" Soul Eater from one  
corner to the next.  
When all was destroyed, McDohl fell to his knee's, his chest heaving, his  
lungs burning. "You can't have me...You can't have me..."  
  
  
Lepant, alerted by one of the guards, came running to his Presidents  
office to find the place in ruins, where McDohl knelt, still clutching the sword.  
"Tir?" Lepant called to him calmly.  
McDohl shivered where he sat, his head bowed. "You can't have me...You can't  
have me...You can't have me....no...never....never..."  
"Who cannot have you, sir?" Lepant asked.  
McDohl looked up, a look of terror and anger mixed into his features. Immediately,  
the disillusioned McDohl jumped to his feet and brought his sword up.   
"How dare you take form of my allies!" He growled.  
Lepant stepped back. "...A..are you alright?"  
Suddenly, McDohl fell again, a great weight thrusting him down.   
"...No...I won't succumb...Soul Eater..."  
  
McDohl passed out before Lepant could reach him.  
  
  
McDohl was confined to his bed for what seemed like months. Everyday, Liukan came   
to check his condition. Other than that, only Gremio was allowed into his bed chamber.  
  
He lay in silence, never speaking. It seemed to those who saw him that he  
was at war with himself.  
No one could understand what was going on in that mind of his.  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
2 years later, Banner Village, two weeks before Suikoden 2...  
  
  
  
McDohl knelt low, staring at his relfection in the waters of the lake. After   
a moment he drew back and pierced a worm onto his hook. With a quick flick of his  
hand, the line plopped into the water.  
He let out a contented sigh and leaned against a tree. "This is the life..."  
  
His hand tingled.  
  
"Do remember who's the boss of this outfit..." he said calmly, closing his  
eyes, laying a finger on the line, waiting for a bite.  
  
His hand ceased to itch.  
  
"Good boy..." he said dryly and fell into a comfortable nap.  
  
  
  
  
The end. 


End file.
